1/25 AMT 1959 Buick "Boondock Bomber"

[Drago]

Hello. Does anybody know anything about it? Why hasn't this been reissued yet? Was there any damage to the mold? Is there a story behind this "lost model" that I missed?

[Chris V]

It was the final iteration of the Promo/Craftsman kit tooling. Unfortunately the molds were most likely either damaged, scrapped or lost. 

Hopefully Round2 will consider this cool subject for their "Cloning programme"... 

[Carmak]

In the early 70's AMT scrapped many of its the molds were considered obsolete at the time. A high percentage of these molds were for annuals or promos. The molds for this were most likely scrapped during this purge.

Round2 has found a few molds that were thought to be scrapped (like the Mach Won Mustang) but those are rare gems and not the norm.

Edited March 19 by Carmak

[Drago]

Too bad knowing this 
Thanks guys

[Drago]

On 3/19/2025 at 5:04 AM, Chris V said:

It was the final iteration of the Promo/Craftsman kit tooling. Unfortunately the molds were most likely either damaged, scrapped or lost. 

Hopefully Round2 will consider this cool subject for their "Cloning programme"... 

I hope that too...💪

[stavanzer]

My Take?

If you want one, buy one. It really doesn't matter how much it costs.  Think of it as a Couple Months worth of your Yearly Modeling Budget in one purchase.

While I would greatly like to be proven wrong, I don't see a 66 Year old kit being cloned anytime soon. The Group of prospective buyers for these kits shrinks more every day.  For today's young builders, a Nostalgia Kit is a Car from 1999-2005.

[Mark]

Those two 1969 reissue series ("Wild Flower" and "desert racers") were the last roundup for most of those kits.  A few have survived but some were modified later.  

The Fifties cars were likely thought to be obsolete, as by 1969 the only place you saw many of the 1:1 cars was at a demolition derby.  Too, the tooling for those was probably worn slap out, as they had been promotional models, annual kits, then Craftsman series kits, all of which sold in way bigger numbers than anything sells today. 

Interesting to note...no Chevrolets in either of those series.  The earliest ones were probably worn out long before that.  I've got a '59 Impala convertible Craftsman kit that never got built because one of the chrome parts was molded incompletely (the broken end of the part is plated over).  The tool probably got pulled and scrapped once that was discovered.  A hardtop Craftsman Impala was announced but I don't think it ever got produced for just that reason.

[oldcarfan]

I read a long time ago, so this could be false, but I read that the model companies had to pay taxes on the molds for some reason. Maybe the potential profit that they held? Supposedly that encouraged them to scrap the old molds. 

[Mark]

Tooling still in their possession had to be assigned a value.  If, at the time, they didn't see any potential use for it in the future, they'd declare it to be worthless and "write it off".  

[Drago]

22 minutes ago, Mark said:

Tooling still in their possession had to be assigned a value.  If, at the time, they didn't see any potential use for it in the future, they'd declare it to be worthless and "write it off".  

Do we have anyone from Round2 as a member of this board? 
I mean... I know if somebody from Round2 beeing active here, he/she will spend most of the timelife awnsering tons of questions from boring modelers like me 😄
But at least, once in a while, it would be nice read some feedback regrding ours desires...

Edited June 9 by Drago

[Mark]

All of that older stuff getting scrapped was long before Round 2, or even Ertl, entered the picture.  Ertl got pretty active as far as unearthing old tooling, and Round 2 is picking up where Ertl left off.  They aren't going to say what is there or not there.  That way, if something were to be found but later discovered to be not usable, they don't end up with a bunch of people mad at them for not bringing it out.  

[Carmak]

2 hours ago, Drago said:

Do we have anyone from Round2 as a member of this board? 
I mean... I know if somebody from Round2 beeing active here, he/she will spend most of the timelife awnsering tons of questions from boring modelers like me 😄
But at least, once in a while, it would be nice read some feedback regrding ours desires...

There is at least one decision maker at Round2 that is an active member of this board. His name in this forum is "SteveG". You may also meet Steve at events the Round2 displays at.

The best place to ask questions about possible future kits is in the "Car Kit News & Reviews" section of this forum.

Before you ask about future kits take a look at the many posts where original vintage and new "clone" molds are discussed.

Some things to keep in mind about the plastic model car BUSINESS and how it has changed since the golden area (late 50's to early 70's):

* Plastic model cars were one of the most popular hobbies in the late 50's to mid 60's and they sold in fairly high volume

* Model kits known as "annuals" (a model car made the year the car was new) were typically repurposed molds used to make dealer promo cars. The dealer promo car molds were paid for by the car companies. Therefore, the model kits companies were not having to fully pay for their molds. You 59 Buick is essentially an unassembled dealer promo car.

These two factors meant that model kits were good business in this 60's. Today's kit volumes are a tiny fraction of the 60's and there are no car companies paying for molds of cars from 60 years ago, so the model kit business is much more challenging than it once was.

Having said all that doom and gloom Round2 is actively making new molds of cool old cars. They recently announced a new mold of the 1960 Chevy station wagon. Part of the reason they did this is the very high demand in the collector world for the 1960 Chevy wagon kits that survive from the 60's. Over that last few years they have made new molds for other very desirable vintage kits such as 1960 Ford truck, 1963 Ford truck, 1964 Chevelle, 1968 Coronet and 1971 Dodge Demon. I am sure there are other cool things in process at Round2.

[Drago]

1 hour ago, Carmak said:

...I am sure there are other cool things in process at Round2.

Yeap, I know every word you wrote is true.. I got the picture. 
My initial topic is based exactly on your last sentence, hopping that (in a distant hope) perhaps one of my wishes could still be a good option for Round2

[Drago]

4 hours ago, Mark said:

All of that older stuff getting scrapped was long before Round 2, or even Ertl, entered the picture.  Ertl got pretty active as far as unearthing old tooling, and Round 2 is picking up where Ertl left off.  They aren't going to say what is there or not there.  That way, if something were to be found but later discovered to be not usable, they don't end up with a bunch of people mad at them for not bringing it out.  

Mad at them??? Nooo, we are not these kind of people 😁

[Beans]

2 hours ago, Carmak said:

* Model kits known as "annuals" (a model car made the year the car was new) were typically repurposed molds used to make dealer promo cars. The dealer promo car molds were paid for by the car companies. Therefore, the model kits companies were not having to fully pay for their molds. You 59 Buick is essentially an unassembled dealer promo car.

That's what an annual is!!  Now I know.  I always thought it was some model or other that was release for one year only or something like that but never knew exactly.  

[Falcon Ranchero]

The ‘62 Galaxie I believe is in the same boat as the ‘59 Buick, also last issued in 1969 as part of that Desert Racers series. I would like to see both kits be reissued again, especially the Galaxie because I wanted to do a build representing my grandfather’s ‘62 that he had back in the day.

[bobss396]

13 hours ago, Falcon Ranchero said:

The ‘62 Galaxie I believe is in the same boat as the ‘59 Buick, also last issued in 1969 as part of that Desert Racers series. I would like to see both kits be reissued again, especially the Galaxie because I wanted to do a build representing my grandfather’s ‘62 that he had back in the day.

I'd like to see the '62 Ford as well. I have a resurrected hardtop glue bomb (BACK IN THE BOX!!) that I have to finish up. I have 2 complete '62 convertible kits too, unbuilt.